Ruby
by Judith Kharyat
Summary: When clearing out a raider encampment, Nora and Hancock make an unexpected discovery. Complete, but I'm publishing in chapters because it's a little long for a one-shot. There will probably be about five chapters in all.
1. Chapter 1

The dog days of summer weren't treating me well. Heat, not enough darkness, too many dreams. And now raiders holed up in the Federal Ration Stockpile building again, harassing a nearby settlement for "tribute." You'd have thought by now word would have gotten around that harassing certain settlements tended to end up with you and your band in tiny bloody chunks all over the floors and walls of the Federal Ration Stockpile building, but either some people never learn, or new people who've never learned keep coming along.

I was used to it, or should have been. Maybe that was the problem. The same places every time, the raiders or super mutants who always seemed to move back in just a few weeks or months after I cleared the last batch out, the junk I loaded up to carry home to my workbenches- there was a sameness about it. I zoned out sometimes in the middle of the shooting, and blinked myself back to full awareness surrounded by corpses, with some freshly stripped mutant hound meat leaking blood all over the extra ammo in my pack. _Oh, time to head home._ It was a good thing Hancock usually insisted on coming along; he'd talk to me, keep me focused.

I paused in the doorway at the top of the stairs, gun out.

"Anybody who wants to live through the next thirty minutes," I bellowed, "put your hands up!"

"Just once," said Hancock, as the raiders started shooting at us, "I wish we could try the stealth approach."

"I like to give them a chance, at least," I said, and picked off two of them with clean headshots. "It does work sometimes, you'll admit."

I thought it hadn't worked at all today- we'd killed about a dozen of them already- when we finally found one with his hands up.

"Don't shoot me," he said.

"Good move, chief," I said. "Let's talk about what happens next."

"You can take everything," he said. "Check out the locked room over there- the key's on the desk. You can take what's in there, you can use it, or sell it-"

"Sounds interesting," said Hancock, and unlocked the door. He took one look inside, then came back over, put his gun to the raider's forehead, and pulled the trigger.

"Jesus Christ, Hancock!" I said. "What the fuck?"

"Go look," he said grimly.

What was in the room was a girl, curled up naked on a dirty mattress. Her hair was auburn and raggedly short; I guessed it had been cut with a knife. I could see all of her ribs, standing out against the bruises and welts and scars on her skin.

"Oh," I said. "Fair enough."

"Here," said Hancock, and stripped off his coat- the original John Hancock's red frock coat, not too much the worse for four hundred years of preservation and the first and last few years of wear. "Put this on her. I'll wait out here."

I went in and got down on the floor next to her, on my knees on the cold concrete, which was starting to be something I noticed was uncomfortable, although it wasn't something I was likely to stop doing anytime soon, not with a world out there to scavenge for junk.

"Hey there," I said, but she didn't react. I touched her shoulder lightly. She twitched, but that was all.

"It's all right," I said. "You're going to be all right now. We're going to get you out of here."

When she still didn't look up, I put a hand on one thin, cold shoulder and pulled her, as gently as I could, over onto her back. Her face was puffy and bony both, with big black circles under the big blue eyes, and a bruise on her mouth. She looked eighteen or twenty or twenty-two- it's hard for me to tell any more; she looked young, too young to be here, the way soldiers used to in the pictures they flashed on television, the way so many people are starting to look to me now. She eyed me with an eerie kind of calm, as if she couldn't imagine anything worse happening right now than had already happened to her, so why bother being scared?

"Hey there," I said again. "I'm not going to hurt you, I promise. Can you sit up?"

She tried, and I tried to help without hurting her, and with a few winces and gasps we got her sitting up. I put Hancock's coat around her shoulders.

"Put your arms in the sleeves," I told her, and she did. I got it fastened in front, so that she was more or less decent, or would be, when- "Can you stand up?"

That was a little harder. She tried, but her legs were shaking, and she kept lurching against me, and finally collapsed to her knees, looking up at me plaintively, as if hoping I'd see she'd done her best.

"Hancock," I called, wanting some help lifting her, and he stepped into the room. She screamed, a full-throated, steam-engine scream, and flung her arms around my leg, clinging so tightly she almost dragged me off balance. He stepped back again, quickly, out of her line of sight.

"I guess she's not used to ghouls," I said, hoping Hancock wasn't too hurt by her obvious horror. "Hancock's not a feral, kid. He's a friend. He wouldn't hurt a hair on your head. That's his coat you're wearing."

She let go of my leg, slowly, and sat back on her heels, looking up at me. I sat back down next to her and took off my pack.

"What's your name?" I asked, pulling out a bottle, and she shook her head. "No? I'm Nora. That's Hancock. Here."

I offered her the bottle, but she looked at me as if she didn't understand. I took the cap off and held it out to her again, but she still didn't take it. Finally I held it to her lips, and she drank, like a baby.

Refreshing Beverage might have a stupid name- some scientist must have named it when she invented the recipe, which involves water and the contents of stimpaks and a couple of drugs and purified water and, weirdly enough, blood- but it fixes you right up. Not only do you feel better right away, but it heals radiation sickness and chem addiction. It isn't easy to make, or to find the ingredients, but I figured the girl's need was greater than mine was ever likely to be.

I tipped the bottle all the way up when it was almost empty, and spilled a little bit on her face. I reached to wipe it off, and she gasped and flinched.

"Easy, now," I said, wiping it off as carefully as I could with my sleeve. "Let's sit here a little while and see if you feel better, all right?"

"Thank you," she whispered.

"You're welcome," I said, relieved to confirm that she could at least speak English. "Once you feel like you can walk, we can get you home. Where is home?"

She looked up at me. I couldn't tell what that look meant- although, on reflection, I could guess. She'd obviously been here a long time, to be in such a state, and if nobody had rescued or ransomed her, it was likely that everyone who cared about her was already dead. And she didn't want to talk about it.

"Well, we can't leave you here," I said. "I guess I'll take you back to my own home for right now. Fair warning, though, there are a bunch of ghouls there. Not ferals- nobody will hurt you. They're good people. It's a good place."

Her eyes darted towards the door, and then back at me, the whites showing all around their edges.

"Are you going to keep me?" she asked hoarsely.

"What's that, hon?"

"Please don't sell me," she said. "Keep me for yourself. You won't regret it."

She put her hand on my thigh and squeezed it, a caressing, undulant pressure, clearly intended to be seductive, which didn't go well with the panic in her eyes.

I took her hand off my leg and held it between my hands. It was cold as ice, and her fingers gripped mine convulsively.

"It's not like that, kid," I said. "Nobody's going to be selling you, because nobody owns you. You're a free agent. As soon as you can walk, you can walk away from me anytime. But if you want my advice, I think you should stick with me for a bit, because it's not safe out here alone, and I can take you somewhere safe, where you can rest and eat and start figuring out what you want to do next. Does that sound like a plan?"

She looked at me like there were words written on my face that she couldn't quite decipher, but after a minute, she nodded.

"Good," I said. "Are you feeling better?"

She nodded again. I stood up and held out my hands, and she took them, and let me pull her to her feet and lead her out into the main room.

"I'd help carry her," said Hancock from a far wall where he'd retreated, "but, uh..."

"No need," I said. "She's feeling better now. You all right there, sweetheart? Don't be scared. It's all right now. It's going to be all right."

"Mom!"

As we approached the Slog, Shaun came running down the slope towards us. He flung his arms around my waist in a bear hug, then looked up curiously at the auburn-haired girl wearing Hancock's red coat.

"Hey, Shaun," I said. "Brought you that biometric scanner you wanted. It's in my pack."

"Neat!" he said. "I bet I can make something really good with that. Hi! I'm Shaun."

The girl looked down at him, and then at me, glancing back and forth a couple of times. Shaun looked at me, puzzled- I guessed- why she didn't introduce herself in return.

"Shaun is my son," I told her, in my role as Captain Obvious of the Helpful Patrol. "Shaun, this is a friend who's going to be staying with us for a little while. But she doesn't want to tell us her name yet, so we need something to call her. What do you think?"

"Ruby," he said promptly, and I laughed.

"After _Grognak and the Ruby Ruins_?" I asked, and he nodded enthusiastically.

"What do you think?" I asked her.

Something happened at the corners of her puffy mouth, something I was willing to fool myself into thinking was the beginnings of a smile.

"Ruby it is then," I said. "At least for now. Let's get you some clothes, all right? Hancock's going to want his coat back."

Most of the Slog residents slept in one big bunkhouse, but I'd built a few little shacks here and there for privacy if people wanted it. Mostly they didn't- there was a communal comfort to the bunkhouse. One shack I'd made into a clubhouse for Shaun, with his toys and comic books and disassembled junk and weapon mods in progress scattered everywhere, and one was officially mine and Hancock's, but the rest were just kind of there in case anybody ever felt the need. I took her to one of the unoccupied ones- I'd put a bed and a chair and a little dresser in each one- and brought her a few outfits from collective storage, and stood outside while she changed. She came out wearing a loose blue cotton dress and offering me the armload of other outfits. I took Hancock's coat and handed the rest of them back to her.

"Keep them," I said. "It's nice to have options. Put them in your dresser. You can stay here as long as you want. Nobody will bother you. I'm going to go get you some food, OK?"

I happened to have the ingredients on hand to make squirrel stew, which is one of my favorites and which I'd been looking forward to myself, but I hadn't been locked in a closet eating God knows what and getting raped all the time for God knows how long, so. When I came back with the bowl, she was kneeling on the floor by the bed, her hands clasped neatly in the folds of her skirt, like a little girl saying her prayers. Maybe she _was_ praying. She looked up at me with that same almost-peaceful lack of expectation. Waiting.

"Do you want to eat down there, or do you want to sit in the chair?" I asked. "It's a nice chair. I built it myself."

She looked over at the chair, and then back at me, hesitating. I put the bowl down on the dresser and held out my hands to her, and after a second, she took them and let me pull her to her feet again. Watching me, she crossed to the chair and sat down. I slid the bowl across the dresser towards her, with the spoon sticking out of it. She didn't move to touch it.

"That's for you," I said. "When you're done eating, you can come out and meet everybody if you want, or if you're not feeling up for that just yet, you can get some sleep if you want to, or- just relax. It's completely up to you."

"Thank you, ma'am," she said softly.

"You don't need to call me ma'am," I said. "Unless you enlist with the Minutemen, which you're welcome to do once you get your strength back. Anything else I can get you right now?"

"No, thank you," she said.

"Come find me if there is," I said. "I'll be around, close by. If you don't see me, you can ask anybody. Nobody will hurt you or- do anything to you. All right?"

"Yes, ma'am," she said, and then drew in her breath sharply and looked up at me in obvious distress. "I'm sorry, I- I mean-"

"My name's Nora," I said. "But if _ma'am_ is a habit, don't stress about it. You can call me Mistress of Mystery, or Grognak the Barbarian, if you want to. I mean, I'm going to be calling you Ruby Ruins, at least until you tell me your real name."

She didn't smile, or answer. She just watched me.

"Well," I said. "I'll let you eat."

After I'd closed the door behind me, I rang the bell to assemble the rest of the Slog, so I could give a little speech about not crowding her or startling her or expecting her to laugh at any jokes unless they were a lot funnier than mine.

" _Everybody's_ jokes are funnier than yours, Nora," said Holly, and a couple of people chuckled.

"They are not," said Shaun indignantly. "Did you tell Ruby the one about the piece of string that walks into the bar?"

"I'll tell her that one tomorrow," I said. "Anybody have any questions, or have we moved on to the part of the evening where everyone mocks me except my generous-hearted child?"

"Is 'Ruby' going to do her fair share of work?" asked David, one of the non-ghouls who'd moved in and settled down once I started building up the Slog. "Because if she's not, then I don't think it's fair to expect us to feed her, when we barely have enough for ourselves."

"I'm sorry," I said, raising an eyebrow at him. "Do we have a food shortage?"

He frowned. "We- no, we don't have a _shortage_. But the caps we bring in selling the surplus, we need those for supplies. I'm just talking about basic fairness here. If you work, you eat. It's as-"

"Look," I said. "I hope eventually she'll be able to do some work, but don't act like supporting one extra person for a while is going to break the Slog. You know damn well I take care of you guys. I'll be responsible for the girl and whatever resources she needs, until she gets back on her feet. If you start running low on anything at all, let me know. Otherwise, quit your bitching."

There was a silence.

"You know we appreciate everything you do for us, Nora," said Deirdre after a minute.

"I appreciate all of you too," I said. "That's why I'm raising my kid here, and why I brought a stranger here to recover from a traumatic experience. I don't think I'll regret either decision. Right? Thanks, everybody. That was all."

After almost everyone had dispersed, Hancock, back in his coat and lingering next to me, said, "Not sure I've ever heard you lay down the law like that before."

I turned to look at him. "Too dictatorial for your tastes?"

"Nah," he said. "Not dictatorial. Mayoral, maybe. Nothing wrong with that." He winked at me. "Kind of a good look on you, actually."

I grinned. "Yeah?"

"Oh yeah," he said. "How about a little mayoral congress back at the state house?"

"John, that's the corniest line I've ever heard."

"Yeah, well," he said, taking my hand and starting for our cabin. "They can't all be winners. Let's see if I can make it up to you."

Afterwards, as we lay side by side on the bed, my smooth skin pressed against his gnarled, irradiated skin, he said, "We did good today, don't you think? Rescued a lady in distress. Blew some bastards' evil brains out."

"Yeah, we did all right," I said.

He brushed the hair back from my face. "Think you might sleep tonight?"

I reddened. "What do you mean? Of course. I sleep."

"Not that much," he said. "Not the last week or so. Don't get pissed, Nora. I ain't accusing you of being a synth. I'm just saying, I go to sleep when you're up, and I wake up and you're still up. Or you're up again."

"So?"

"So I thought you might be-" He hesitated. "Because it must've been about this time, last year. I remember how goddamn hot it was, when- everything happened. I thought you might be- remembering."

"I don't forget," I said. "Not for a second."

"Sure," he said. "I know that. I just- look, if you don't want to talk about it, that's fine."

"I don't," I said tightly.

"Fine."

He was right, of course. I hadn't been sleeping any more than I could help. If dreams don't have anything new to tell you, they should shut the fuck up.


	2. Chapter 2

Ruby stayed in her cabin for more than a week, and I stayed at the Slog, letting other Minutemen handle settlement complaints. (What's the point of having a whole militia if the general has to handle everything herself?) I brought her food and water, and a few treats- gumdrops, Sugar Bombs, Nuka Cherry- that I'd found here and there and stored away. When I came back for the dishes, they were always shining clean, as if she'd licked them out. She always said _thank you, ma'am_ , and not much else. I chatted to her a bit, about the weather, and how the crops were coming in, and she listened and watched me. I'd been a little worried that she would try again to come on to me, but she didn't. I guessed that as a raiders' sex slave, she hadn't been expected to take the lead on seduction all that often. It had been a desperation move, and had probably taken a lot of guts, for her to put her hand on me and make an offer; the fact that she didn't renew it made me hope she felt a little safer now.

One morning, when I brought her breakfast, she said, "I can work, ma'am. What do you want me to do?"

"Oh, that's great," I said. "I mean, I'm glad you've had a chance to rest, but I'm glad you're feeling well enough to work, too. Come with me and I'll give you the tour, and you can decide what you'd like to help with. I'd better get you a hat to keep the sun off your face- you're pale as a mushroom. Do you burn or freckle?"

She just looked at me.

"Well, anyway," I said. "Come on. I'll show you around."

I showed her around- the carrot and corn and tato and mutfruit and razorgrain and melon patches, the tarberry bog, the workbenches and cooking station, the stores and restaurant and clinic, the caravan campground, the playground, and the main bunkhouse, with its central living area where people could hang out in the evenings and play checkers or pool. (I was proud of the pool table, with its complete set of balls, cues, and rack I'd managed to assemble from the various places I'd scavenged. For checkers we used bottlecaps.) I got a wide-brimmed hat from clothes storage, and put it on her head; I could already see freckles popping up on her skin. I showed her the perimeter of turrets, and the further turrets on the roof of the bunkhouse, and the artillery pieces. Everyone smiled and nodded as we walked by, but did a good job not making too much of a fuss of Ruby's sudden presence outside of her cabin. She, in her turn, did a good job not screaming and fainting at the sight of all the ghouls. I guessed Hancock had just startled her, that first time.

"Pretty nice place, huh?" I said, when I'd showed her everything I could think of.

"Yes, ma'am," she said.

"So what kind of work do you want to do?"

"I'll do anything you want me to, ma'am," she said.

"But is there something you think you'd enjoy?"

She hesitated for a minute, watching me, and then said, "I like the- the bog."

"The tarberry bog?"

She nodded.

"Perfect," I said. "Do you want to start right away?"

"Yes, ma'am," she said.

I got her a basket, and she waded solemnly into the swimming pool, her dress ballooning up around her waist. David and a ghoul named Megan were at work in the bog; both of them said, "Hey."

"Ruby, this is David and Megan," I said. "They'll show you how it's done. Don't let them work you too hard on your first day. If you get tired, take a break."

"Yes, ma'am," she said. "Thank you."

I smiled at her. "I'll leave you to it."

She picked tarberries diligently and silently until one in the afternoon, when I called her out of the pool to eat lunch; after she'd eaten, she went back into the bog and picked until six in the evening, when I called her again.

"If you want to go change out of your wet things," I said, "we usually all gather in the bunkhouse for dinner. It's not a formal event or anything, but we take turns cooking, and we chat, and some people play checkers or pool. It might be a nice way to start getting to know everybody here."

"Yes, ma'am," she said.

Once she'd changed into another loose cotton dress, this one pink, I sat her down beside me on the couch and brought her a bowl of Deirdre's vegetable soup. Hancock sat on my other side, resting a hand lightly on the back of my neck; neither of them said much. I didn't either. I'm not the most social person in the world, but I do enjoy dinners at the Slog; there's a lot of chatter, and you can listen without having to respond. Shaun told me all about the targeting computer he'd spent the day trying to perfect, and then lay down on the floor to read an only-slightly-singed Manta Man comic book I'd recently found him.

Ruby ate slowly but with great concentration, not looking anywhere but into her bowl, and held the empty bowl and spoon when she was finished until I took them away from her.

"Thank you, ma'am," she said softly.

"You're welcome," I said. "Glad you felt up to joining us. You did a good solid day's work, too."

"Hey, Ruby," said Wiseman, and she looked up at him, startled. "You play checkers?"

She looked at me.

"Well, do you?" I asked.

She shook her head.

"Want to learn?" asked Wiseman, and she looked at him, and then at me again.

"You don't need my permission to learn to play checkers," I said. "Just check in if somebody offers to teach you Russian roulette."

She didn't react to that- either because she had no idea what the fuck I was talking about, or because Holly had been right about my jokes- but she looked back at Wiseman and nodded.

They played three games, and when she won the third one, she looked up at me again and smiled, the first time I'd seen her really smile. Her teeth were surprisingly good, at least by the standards I'd become accustomed to- hardly anybody's teeth would make it into a 2077 TV commercial, these days- and the smile was gorgeous, shy and radiant at the same time. I smiled back.

"Look at you," I said. "I've never beat Wiseman at checkers. You're a natural."

"Play me, Ruby," said Shaun, who had looked up from his comic book to watch the third match. "I've beat Wiseman before."

"Ruby might be tired, Shaun," I said.

"No, ma'am, I'm not tired," she said. "I'll play again."

…

The next morning, she was working in the tarberry bog and I was sitting cross-legged on the pavement, counting grenades and wondering if I needed to stop by the Castle for more supplies. I wasn't paying attention to the low murmur of conversation in the bog until I heard her say, in a rising tone of what sounded like panic, "No, sir, please-"

I walked up to the edge and looked down into the pool. It was just her and David; when my shadow fell on them, they both looked up guiltily.

I jumped down into the pool and waded towards them. She hung her head. He said defensively, "Yeah?"

"What's up?" I asked. "Everything all right?"

"Fine," he said, and she nodded without raising her head.

"Because when I hear somebody say _no, sir, please_ ," I said, "I somehow feel like everything's not all right."

"It's fine," he said, and when I narrowed my eyes at him, "If you must know, she was eating the tarberries instead of harvesting them. You said you'd be responsible for her, so I said if she didn't stop I'd have to let you know."

"Oh," I said. "Well, now I know. How many did she eat?"

"Just one, that I saw," said David.

"One?" I asked. "Really? This is an issue? So you've never popped a single tarberry in your mouth while you were picking?"

"Of course not," he said virtuously. "That's stealing."

"I- don't see it that way," I said. "But how about this? I'll pay you back. What's the market value of tarberries these days?"

"Five caps a quart," he said. "But that's not-"

"Great," I interrupted. "So I'll add up the cost in materials and skilled labor of everything I've built here at the Slog for general use- buildings, furniture, turrets, water purifier, generators- and the crops I've planted, and the market value of the weapons and ammo and clothing and armor I bring here for you guys to use, and the seed money for the stores and the bar and the clinic, and then we'll subtract all that from the cost of a single tarberry, and divide it by the population of the Slog, and that will be what I owe you for what Ruby ate. Does that sound fair?"

"All right, all right," he said, his face flushed with embarrassment or irritation or both. "Sorry I said anything."

"No worries," I said. "Hey, have a tarberry. On me."

I turned back towards Ruby, and saw that she had gone so white-faced under the shade of her hat's brim that even her lips looked white, and that she was shaking so hard I could actually see her teeth chatter.

"Oh, shit," said David, noticing at the same time I did. "Is she all right?"

"I don't know," I said. "Let me- Ruby, come with me."

"I'm sorry," he said, as I took her by the icy, trembling hand and began to lead her up out of the bog. "I'm really sorry, OK? I didn't mean to-"

"It's all right," I said. "Listen, do me a favor, will you? Will you go heat up some water, at the cooking station? And bring it by her cabin in a minute? Thanks."

I took her, dripping and shivering violently, into her cabin.

"Change into something dry," I told her. "I'll be right back."

I tried to let go of her hand, but she clung to mine with a death grip.

"You need to get into dry clothes, sweetheart," I said. "I think you're in shock."

She let go of me and, as swiftly as she could with her trembling hands, peeled her dress over her head, yanking her hat off in the process, and dropped both dress and entangled hat to the floor.

"Oh- okay," I said, averting my eyes quickly, but not before I'd caught a glimpse- she'd gained some weight in the last ten days, enough that some of her bones were covered again, and most of her bruises seemed to have faded. That was good to know. I heard her open the drawer of her little dresser, and after a few moments, I felt her touch my arm. I turned back towards her; she'd put on her pink dress.

"Sit down," I said, and she sat down obediently on the bed. I knelt down on the floor at her feet and took them in my hands; they were as cold as her hands had been. I held and rubbed them, trying to warm them.

"I should have brought you some socks," I said, "but I didn't think you'd need them, this time of year." There was a knock at the cabin door. "Come in!"

David came in, carrying a steaming ceramic mug.

"I put a little whiskey in it," he said. "Wiseman said- I can go get one without, though, if you think-"

"No, that's great," I said. "Thanks." He offered it to her, and she looked at me. "Yes, it's for you. Take it. Drink it."

She took it, sloshing it a little with her shaking hands, and sipped.

"I'm really sorry," said David, hovering awkwardly beside her. "I didn't mean to- to scare you, Ruby."

She said nothing, just stared at him, owl-eyed, over the rim of the cup.

"She'll be all right," I said. "Don't beat yourself up, David. I think she's just having some kind of post-traumatic stress reaction. Let me sit with her awhile. Thanks for fixing her a drink."

"All right," he said, and left. Her feet had warmed up some; I got up and sat down next to her on the bed.

"Drink up," I said, and when she had swallowed the last of the liquid, I took the cup and set it down on the dresser. "Come here. Lean up against me. Put your head on my shoulder." I wrapped an arm around her and took her hand in mine, rubbing it gently. "Perfect. You've got nothing to be scared of. You're all right. You're safe."

Slowly, over the next ten minutes or so, her shivering abated, and her body relaxed against mine, her breath deepening and evening out.

"Feeling better?" I asked, and she nodded against my shoulder. "You feel like talking about it?"

She didn't respond for awhile, and we sat quietly, her head still on my shoulder. Finally she said, "I thought you'd be angry."

"All that, because you thought I'd be angry with you?" I asked. "For eating a tarberry?"

"For stealing," she said. "He said it was stealing."

"Yeah, well," I said. "It's not. It's called snacking, and everybody does it. Except him, apparently. And even if I _was_ angry, Ruby, what did you think I'd do to you? Do you think I'd hurt you?"

"No, ma'am," she said. "I thought you would- I thought I would have to- leave here."

"Oh, sweetheart," I said. "That's not- you don't have to worry about that, all right? Even if I do get angry with you, which I might, because I'm kind of a bitch sometimes, as David and many others will tell you- I would never send you away. You stay here until _you_ decide you want to go. All right?"

"Thank you, ma'am," she said in a small voice.

I squeezed her hand. "So does that mean you like it here?"

She laughed. I'd never heard her laugh before. It was soft, and I felt it as much as I heard it- the way it shook her body lightly against me.

"Yes, ma'am," she said. "I like it here."

…..

"Hey, Ruby," I said, when I saw her out of her cabin and moving towards the tarberry bog the next morning. "Don't jump in the pool just yet. Come with me."

She looked a little alarmed, but she followed me to my weapons chest, and stood there waiting while I picked out a lightish little pistol without too much recoil. I held it up to show her. She looked at me blankly. Well, at least she wasn't assuming I was about to shoot her. Or if she was, she was apparently at peace with the idea.

"Do you know anything about guns?" I asked, and she shook her head. "All right. Nothing in here is usually kept loaded, although it's always a good idea to check rather than assuming a gun isn't loaded and then finding out the hard way. Look." I slid out the magazine. "That's where the bullets would go. Empty, see?" I clicked it back in and offered it to her. She turned pale and backed up a step, shaking her head.

"It's not loaded, Ruby," I said. "It's not dangerous unless it's loaded. Just take it in your hand."

"No, ma'am," she whispered. "Please. Please, I- I can't."

"Why not?" I asked, but she didn't answer. "Listen, every Commonwealth girl- and boy- should know at least the basics of how to handle a gun."

"But it's safe here, ma'am," she said, gesturing towards the nearest turret.

"As safe as anywhere, and a damn sight safer than most places," I agreed. "I've seen these turrets take out a vertibird in twenty seconds flat. But you never know what's going to happen. When my husband taught me to handle firearms, I didn't think I was going to have much practical use for the knowledge, but look at me now. Plus, it's just a good feeling to know that if something or someone comes after you, there's something you can do about it, if you have to. So let's get started."

She looked on the verge of tears, but she held out her hand, and I put the gun in it. She held it clumsily, as if I'd handed her a dead cat, and her desire not to offend me was just barely stronger than her instinct to throw it back at me.

"Like this," I said, and showed her how to grip it. "See how it feels in your hand. Is it something you think you can handle comfortably? Bear in mind it will be a little heavier when it's loaded."

She held it the way I'd showed her, without looking at me.

"Yes?" I said. "Now squeeze the trigger. It's all right, it's not loaded, remember? Go ahead, squeeze it so you can see how that feels. Feel it click back? That's how much effort it takes to pull the trigger, all right? Now point it at me."

She gasped and looked up at me, white-faced. "Ma'am-"

"Ruby, you're not going to hurt me with an unloaded gun," I said. "And if I were trying to stage a scenario where I kill you in self-defense, I'd make it look way more convincing than this. Point it at my chest, please. Headshots do more damage if they hit, but the good thing about chests is, if you miss the heart, you might get the shoulder or the stomach. Don't look at the gun, look at me. Good. Eyes on me. Are you ready to pull the trigger? Pull it when you're ready."

She squeezed her eyes shut and pulled it.

"Okay," I said. "Again. Eyes open this time, please. It really does improve your aim."

She looked me in the eye for a moment, then lowered her eyes to my chest and pulled the trigger again.

"Good," I said. "You hit me right in the tit. But I'm still coming at you. I'm a crazy one-tit raider on Psychobuff. Shoot me again."

She giggled, a little hysterically, as I walked towards her, miming a slow-motion snarl, and she pulled the trigger again. I lifted my hand and gripped her wrist, and she dropped the gun immediately.

"Is that what you're going to do if a raider grabs your arm when you have a gun on her?" I asked, stooping to pick the gun back up, and she nodded. "No it's not, Ruby. Let me show you what you're going to do instead. This time I'm going to be the one with the gun, all right? And you grab my wrist, and I'll show you."

I pointed the gun at her, and she whimpered faintly before putting her hand very lightly on my wrist. I actually wasn't sure how to demonstrate this move effectively without hurting her, but I managed to do it in more or less slow motion, putting less body weight behind it than I normally would have, and shoving the muzzle of the gun- gently- up under her chin.

"And then you fire again," I said, pulling away. "Bam. Just imagine being able to do that to those raiders that hurt you before. Doesn't that sound good? Here, you try it on me."

She didn't drop the gun this time when I grabbed her wrist, but she let me push her arm back until the gun was pointing at her face, and then squeezed the trigger again in a panic.

"Oops," I said. "You shot yourself in the face. Don't do that."

"Yes, ma'am," she said. "I mean, no, ma'am."

"Good," I said. "Now let's try this again."

We practiced an hour or so every day, after that; aiming, not dropping the gun, pulling the trigger when it was pointed somewhere other than her face, and eventually loading the gun and shooting at trees. It was actually pretty fun, teaching her; she relaxed more and more, and even laughed every now and then, at a joke or a mistake. After a week, I gave her a belt to wear the gun on, with the first chamber empty for my own peace of mind, and hers. She didn't put it on, though. She hung it, solemnly, on a protruding nail in her cabin, next to her bed.

"I won't need it, unless something changes," she said. "Thank you, ma'am. For teaching me."

"You're welcome," I said. "We'll keep practicing, all right?"

She nodded. "Yes, ma'am. I'd like that. Thank you."

….

"She's doing better, don't you think?" I asked Hancock, as we shucked corn into baskets. "She barely even seems scared anymore, just- very, very polite."

"She's not scared when you're anywhere in her line of sight," said Hancock. "When you're not, she spends a lot of time looking around for you. But yeah, I agree, she's a lot better than she was."

"And I can understand why she might not want to talk about where she comes from," I said. "I mean, if her whole family's dead, and God knows a lot of people's whole families are, then sure, it could take a while before she feels like discussing it. But what I don't get is, why won't she even tell us her _name_?"

"How the hell should I know?" he asked, peeling silk threads from between the kernels. "She'll tell you when she's ready. I think Ruby's kinda cute."

"Oh, you do?"

"The _name_ Ruby," he said. "The girl's ugly as homemade sin. Next to you, anyway."

I rolled my eyes and threw a cornhusk at him. "You don't have to seduce me any more, Hancock. I surrender. I'll have sex with you anytime you want."

"Fuck yeah," he said. "How about tonight?"

"Sure," I said, already thinking past the sex- which would be great, it was always great, no complaints there- to the part where he'd fall asleep and I'd still be awake. It had been long enough now- I was tired enough- that I'd started knocking back chems to stay awake, and it wasn't going to work forever. Maybe if I drank enough before lying down, I wouldn't dream.


	3. Chapter 3

Hancock and I split a bottle of bourbon before bed, talking and laughing, then making love, slow and easy and just a little drunken. When he fell asleep, I felt unreasonably abandoned. I tried lying down and closing my eyes, then got up and drank another half bottle, much too quickly; after a little while, I walked out by the pool, dizzy and nauseated, dragging in big breaths of coolish night air in hopes that it would make me feel better, which it did not. Finally I stumbled and fell face down in the dirt of the tato patch, and lay there, too tired and sick to even try to get up.

I dreamed in flashes about a crashing airship, children burning and screaming, and woke up retching and covered with sweat, with Ruby kneeling over me, touching my cheek with her hand. I batted at her reflexively, and she pulled her hand back.

"You should be in bed, ma'am," she said, so softly it was almost a whisper. "May I help you to bed?"

"No," I managed. "Leave me alone."

She didn't move.

"You're shivering," she said. "And sweating. If you stay out here, you'll be ill."

"I said leave me alone," I said. I couldn't deal with her right now, not with the gentleness and tact she needed. I didn't have it in me. "I'm fine."

"You are not fine," she said. "Please, let me-"

She put her hands on my shoulders, and I jerked away violently.

"I said _leave me alone_ , goddammit," I snarled, and immediately felt even worse than before, which was pretty impressive. She got up and backed away. I considered briefly trying to get up and go after her, to try to comfort her and apologize for speaking so harshly, but after a second, I put my head back down in the dirt and closed my eyes.

"Hey," said Hancock's rasping voice, not very long after that. "Let's not be taking any dirt naps just yet. Come on, let's get you back to bed."

He picked me up like I was a baby, or a bride being carried over the threshold of something, and then said, over his shoulder, "Thanks, kid. I got it from here."

I tilted my head back over his arm and saw an upside-down Ruby, twisting her hands together, her face milk-white in the moonlight. She met my gaze for a second, then turned and ran.

"She woke you up?" I asked, my cheek pressed against the ancient cloth of Hancock's coat, as he carried me back toward our cabin.

"I thought I was dreaming," he said. "Little Ruby who's never said three words to me, much less touched me, and she's shaking my shoulder, grabbing my hand. 'Mister Hancock, please, sir, I need you to come with me.' And there you're sprawled out on the ground- but you're still breathing. If it was one of those dreams, you wouldn't still be breathing."

He sat down on the bed with me and held a bottle of Refreshing Beverage to my lips, tipping it up until I'd drained it; I felt the nausea abate, the headache soften around the edges and then shrink into nothingness. He laid me down and vanished briefly, then reappeared with a cool, damp cloth, and bathed my face with it, getting the mud off from the combined sweat and dirt. Then he climbed into bed beside me, curled around me from behind, his rough and ragged lips on my neck.

"I'm sorry," I said. It was easier to say it with my eyes closed, in the dark. Facing away from him.

"Yeah, well," he said. "You've been through some bad business, and it's going to take you time and life lived before you get over it. If a person ever gets all the way over that kind of shit, which I ain't convinced they do. But part of the shit I'm never gonna get over means I got nothing but time for you, love. I'm in this for the long haul. And there's no place I'd rather be."

When I woke up again, there was sunlight in the windows, and he was gone. I got up, drank some water, and went outside. Hancock was cooking something at the grill; he smiled when he saw me and lifted a hand. Ruby was in the tarberry bog, working, and didn't look up.

I went back to my cabin and opened the top drawer of the dresser, where I kept a few odds and ends. Nate's wedding ring; a little wooden soldier a friend once gave me; a couple of holotapes; an old issue of _Publick Occurrences_ ; a miniature Giddyup Buttercup toy. I used to have a drawer full of junk jewelry- earrings and necklaces and bracelets- before the end of the world. The only jewelry I wear now is my wedding ring. I kept the first silver locket I ever found, though, because it was so pretty, and so unexpected, lying loose and still bright at the bottom of a tool case, under a pack of duct tape and a screwdriver. Heart-shaped, on a tarnished but unbroken silver chain. When I'd built this place, I'd put it in the drawer, along with the other things I kept for reasons other than survival.

I walked back out by the pool. David and Megan looked up, but she didn't.

"Hey, Ruby," I said, and she lifted her head. "Come here a minute."

She waded slowly up out of the bog, her half-full basket on her arm.

"Come sit with me," I said, and dragged two of the poolside patio chairs under the shade of an umbrella-topped table. I sat down in one, and she took the other, her eyes lowered, her basket at her feet.

"I owe you an apology, for last night," I said, and she looked up quickly. "I acted like a complete jackass, and you were incredibly sweet and kind- and pretty brave, to go get Hancock for me, because I know you're still a little nervous around him. So yeah, I wanted to apologize, and thank you. And I wanted to give you this."

I held the locket out to her, but she didn't reach to take it, just looked at me.

"It's for you," I said. "It's a present. Just something I found a while back, and thought was pretty. I thought you might like it."

She finally reached out, but she didn't actually take it, just held out her hand palm up, and I dropped the locket into it. She stared at it for a second, then looked up at me as if I'd handed her the moon: awestruck, and more than a little confused about what to do next.

"Do you want help putting it on?" I asked. She didn't answer, but when I leaned across the table, she tilted her head forward, and I fastened the thin silver chain around her neck. "There. That looks lovely. Do you like it?"

She looked at me, her blue eyes wide and bright.

"Thank you," she said finally.

"You're welcome," I said. "Thank _you_. You're a pretty amazing person, you know. Especially considering how recently it was that you were screaming and grabbing my leg at the sight of Hancock."

"When I was- before," she said. "With the, the raiders. Not the ones you killed. Before that." She looked up at me seriously. "Because sometimes they would sell me, or trade me."

"How long were you-?" I began, feeling sick.

"I don't know," she said. "What year is it?"

"2288," I said.

"It was 2287 when- when the first ones- took me," she said. "The end of January." She shook her head, as if shaking something off, or out. "But- once- they were clearing out a new building. The raiders that had me. To move in. And they killed a lot of the, the ferals. But they left the bodies. Lying on the floors. And the room they locked me in, there was one in there. And then it- got up."

"Holy fucking hell," I said.

"They opened the door and killed it," she said. "They were all laughing. They gave me a stimpak." She was watching me intently; I didn't know what she was looking for, but I hoped she was finding it. "I didn't know- when I first saw Mr. Hancock- I didn't know there were ghouls like the ones here. That's why I screamed."

"Well, you've adjusted- _really_ well, considering," I said. "But- so you'd _never_ seen a ghoul who wasn't feral? Where did you grow up?"

She didn't answer.

"All right, if you don't want to tell me, you don't want to tell me," I said. "But you can't blame me for wondering. I mean, there's a limited number of places you could grow up without ever once running into an intelligent ghoul. There's Diamond City- all right, so you grew up in Diamond City, and you somehow pissed off Mayor McDonogh and he had you kidnapped by raiders in retribution, in which case you'll be glad to hear I recently killed the living shit out of Mayor McDonogh and I can take you back to Diamond City anytime you want."

"I'm not from Diamond City," she said, with a faint smile.

"Oh," I said. "Hmm. Well. There are Vaults- you're not from Vault 81, are you? I'm actually on good visiting terms with Vault 81, so if you're worried about compromising their location- no? There's the Brotherhood of Steel- you were raised by the Brotherhood of Steel, which explains why you call everybody _sir_ and _ma'am_ all the time. The reason you pretended not to know anything about guns was because you didn't want me to realize just how terrifyingly weapons proficient you really are- oh, Ruby, sweetheart, my God, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to upset you. Were you really with the Brotherhood?"

She shook her head, tears spilling from her eyes.

"I- I should be working, ma'am," she said, and stood up.

"Ruby-"  
She picked up her basket and walked back into the tarberry bog, without looking at me again.

I didn't chase her, and when she re-emerged for dinner, she seemed fine- she sat next to me on the couch for dinner, and even leaned very lightly against me. I didn't bring up what had happened, and she, of course, was quiet.

The next day, I didn't see her in the tarberry bog all morning, and when noon came, I was concerned- it wasn't like her to miss work. I knocked on the door of her cabin, waited awhile, knocked again, and when she still didn't answer, I opened the door. She wasn't in there. Her gun belt was gone, too, and the gun with it. Hanging from the nail instead was the silver locket.

…..

"Nora," said Hancock, holding me tightly against him, pinning my arms to my sides. "It was her choice."

"I pushed her, I badgered her, I made her cry-"

"She made a choice," he said.

"I would have taken her- anywhere- kept her safe-"

"Yeah," he said, "and she knew that. And she made a choice."

"She's going to die, John," I said fiercely. "That's the choice she made. She has eight bullets in her gun, and she's going to miss with at least three of them. She's out there bleeding out with a bloatfly larva in her chest, or getting ripped apart by a deathclaw, or lining a super mutant meat bag, or-"

"Stop that, Nora," he said sharply. "She was free to stay or to go, and she went. That's all. The end."

I wrenched myself out of his grip. "I can't- I just- I need a drink."

"You do what you gotta," he said. "But-"

"I won't fall down in the tato patch again," I said. "Promise."

…

I drank steadily for the rest of the day, although I paced myself well enough and mixed in enough chems that I stayed upright, everything blurred just to the point of bearability. I skipped dinner, sitting out by the tarberry bog instead; when dusk was falling, Shaun brought me a noodle cup.

"No, thanks, sweetheart," I said. "I'm not hungry."

"Mr. Hancock said not to ask you about Ruby," he said, and I made the effort to smile at him.

"Nicely circumvented, kiddo," I said. "Ruby decided to leave, and not to tell us where she was going, which is sad. I'm really sad about it."

"I'm sad about it too," he said. "When is she coming back?"

"I don't know," I said. "Will you let me be by myself for right now, please? I love you, Shaun."

"I love you too, mom," he said, and went back inside, leaving the noodle cup beside me.

I stopped drinking vodka then, and started drinking water, and then, after everyone was in bed, a Nuka Cola Quantum or two. The world began to sharpen into focus again as the sky lightened. People started waking back up and getting to work. Life went on. I knew that. No one knew that better than me. The day brightened and heated up; everything moved around me.

Just when I was seriously considering going back to my cabin and trying to sleep a little, I heard someone shout from the other side of the bunkhouse, and then a turret firing briefly. That wasn't uncommon- bloatflies and stingwings seemed to have trouble grasping the concept of a well-defended perimeter- and I didn't get up until I heard Hancock shout my name.

I went- I was sober by now, just a little wobbly on the dismount from sitting in one position for so long- and found Hancock and four other settlers with their guns trained on a raider, who was clutching a bleeding, dangling arm.

"Don't shoot me," he said. "Fuckin' turrets, Jesus Christ. I ain't here to fight, just delivering a message."

He held out a holotape. When I put it into my Pip-Boy, my heart spasmed painfully at the sound of her voice.

 _She doesn't pay ransoms. She says it just encourages kidnapping._

A rough woman's voice: _Well, you better hope you can change her mind, sweet tits. Everybody knows she's got the caps. See if you can beg pretty enough to get her to trade 'em for you. Tell her you'll work it off on your knees._

 _She's not going to pay. You should let me go._

 _Look, you little cunt, the rest of this tape can be you talking, or you screaming. Up to you which you think might get your girlfriend to pay up._

There was a brief pause.

 _Nora?_

It was the first time I'd ever heard her say my name.

 _I'm sorry about this, ma'am. You're probably angry with me, for being so stupid, thinking I'd be all right out here. I did shoot some things, that attacked me. Animals. I killed three of them. You would've been-_

There was the sound of a sharp impact, and she cried out in pain.

 _You want to get to the fucking point?_

 _These, these people, they want you to pay a ransom. A thousand caps. Or they'll kill me. I'm sorry, ma'am, to be so much trouble. But I'll see you soon, and I'll have- just one last favor to ask. I've been thinking- what? What do you want me to say? I_ told _her about the ransom._

The tape ended. I looked up at Hancock, then at the raider.

"Damn," I said. "A thousand caps? That's pretty steep. Is that because I'm so rich, or because my girl's so good-lookin'?"

"I don't set the ransoms," he said. "Lady, I'm bleeding out over here. I ain't going to make it back with the caps unless you patch me up a little bit."

"Oh," I said. "How remiss of me. I'll be right back. Try not to move."

I went to load my pack. Hancock followed me, leaving the others to guard the raider.

"You're smiling," he observed.

"Did you hear her?" I asked. " _I'll see you soon?_ Not a doubt in the world. I love it."

"Yeah, that was pretty cute," he said. "But what about that _one last favor_ business?"

"Oh, I just figure she realizes now it was dumb to leave on her own, and she wants me to take her somewhere," I said, swinging my pack onto my back. "Right? Hey, Hancock?"

"I take requests," he said.

"Do you mind if I go without you?" I asked, and he raised a nonexistent eyebrow. "I just- I want to talk to her. See what she has to say. Why she left, and what she wants to have happen now. I think it might be easier if it's just her and me."

"Plus you want to be the one to kill that bitch on the tape," he said.

I nodded. "Plus that."

He eyed me thoughtfully. "Let's see you walk a straight line."

I sighed and walked a straight line, heel to toe, to the pool's edge and back.

"All right," he said. "But be careful, will you?"

"I'll be careful." I kissed him, quickly, on the mouth. "I love you."  
"Uh-huh," he said. "Just come back safe, Nor. Or there's not going to be anybody to pick _me_ up out of the tato patch."

I went back to the raider and stuck a stimpak unceremoniously into his wounded arm. He yelped.

"You're welcome," I said. "Let's head out."

"You got the caps?" he said. "Just like that? Let's see 'em."

"Mister," I said, "you are sorely confused about your situation right now. The caps are no longer part of the equation. You're going to take me to my friend. Then we'll see what happens."

"Ah, shit," he said, looking from me to Hancock to the other four with guns trained on him. "Look, this wasn't my idea. I told Deb-"

"Walk and talk," I told him, pointing my gun at him. "Or save your breath. We'll talk when we get there."


	4. Chapter 4

When he'd taken me close enough to their hideout- Back Street Apparel, for a change- for me to spot a couple of raiders guarding the front entrance, I backed up a little and put the muzzle of my gun into his ear.

"No," he said, sweat gleaming on his forehead. "Please, lady, for Christ's sake. I'm just trying to survive out here."

"I get that," I said. "I do. And funnily enough, I'm actually glad you and your friends found my friend and held her for ransom, because it probably saved her from something worse. So. Who's the woman on the holotape? The one getting all slap-happy?"

"Her name's Deb," he said. "She's in charge. She's a fuckin' bitch."

"Yeah, I gathered," I said. "What does she look like?"

"She's tall," he said. "Brown hair. Bangs. Scar on her cheek."

"Is she right-handed or left-handed?" I asked.

"What?"

"Never mind, I'll figure it out," I said. "Now. There are plenty of settlements in the Commonwealth, these days, where you can go and make an honest living and a good life for yourself. Most of them are under my protection, and I visit them pretty regularly. If I see you working at one of them, down the road, I'll shake your hand and buy you a drink. If I see you attacking any of them, or threatening decent people for caps, I'll blow your fucking head off. All right?"

He nodded.

"Thank you," he said, shakily.

"Thank me when I buy you that drink," I said. "Now, when I say go, I want you to start running. That way." I pointed. "Go."

He took off. I headed in.

"Put your hands up," I called to the first two raiders I saw, who immediately shot at me. I picked them off and lather-rinse-repeated for the next ten or so, working my way past the outer defenses, through the first couple of rooms, and down the stairs. Four of them put their hands up when I told them to, and I let them go. When I saw a tall woman with brown bangs and a scar on her cheek rush at me with a tire iron in a right-handed grip, I skipped the put-your-hands-up part, and shot her in the right hand, making her scream, before I killed her.

They were all either dead or long gone when I finally picked a lock to a storage room and found her, kneeling on the floor with her hands tied behind her back. She looked up at me, blinking in the sudden light and smiling, tears spilling down her bruised face.

"Hi, sweetheart," I said, smiling back, as I knelt down beside her to cut her hands free. "Got your holotape."

As soon as her hands were free, she put her arms around my neck and buried her face against my shoulder. I put my arms around her and held her close.

"I knew you'd come," she said, a little muffled against my neck. "I wasn't scared. I knew you'd kill them all."

"Well, I have to admit I let a few of them go," I said. "But I don't think any of them will be bothering you again. Hey, who told you I don't pay ransoms? I never told you that."

"Shaun," she said, pulling away and sitting back on her heels, and wiping at the remnants of her tears with her hand. "He told me about how you rescued Holly from the gunners, and how you tell people not to pay ransoms because the Minutemen will get their friends back safe."

"I need to hire that kid as my press agent," I said, and she smiled again. "So. Are you injured? I see the bruise- and you'll see the bitch's corpse on the way out of here- but is there anything else I can patch up for you?"

She hiked up her dress, unselfconsciously, to show me an ugly-looking gash on her thigh.

"Ouch," I said, getting a stimpak out of my pack. "I heard you gave as good as you got, though. What was it, dogs? Molerats?"

"They were sort of purple," she said, and winced a little as the stimpak needle slid in, then smiled at me. "Thank you. They didn't have any fur."

"Molerats," I said. "Someday you really have to tell me where you're from. I'm proud of you for killing them, sweetheart. So what's this one last favor you've got to ask?"

Her smile dropped, and she looked down at the floor.

"Ruby?" I said. "What's wrong? Have you changed your mind? You can change your mind. Listen, I'll take you anywhere you want to go. Back to the Slog, or- wherever you were going, when you took off."  
"I wasn't going anywhere," she said. "I don't have anywhere to go. I was just going to try to- to make it, on my own."

"But why?" I asked. "I thought you were happy, at the Slog."

"I was," she said, and her tears spilled over again. "I've never been so happy. I was so happy I—I guess I forgot how it was, out here. And when these people grabbed me, I remembered, and I knew I couldn't- I couldn't stand it. So I told them what I told the other ones, the first ones. That they should let me go, because there was somebody who would come for me." She smiled through her tears. "Except this time it was true."

"Did you-" I hesitated. "I don't mean to pry, I really don't, but- last time, did you think it was true?"

She nodded.

"And the person who didn't come- do you know why they didn't come?"

She shook her head.

"Do you want to try to find them, and find out?"

She shook her head again, emphatically.

"It might not be their fault," I said. "All kinds of things might have happened. They might not have been able to find you, or-"

"I don't want to go back to them," she said. "I wasn't happy there, either. I never even knew it was possible to be as happy as I've been with you."

I got a little teary-eyed myself at that. "So- so can I take you back home, then?"

She shook her head.

"Ruby- why not?"

"Because," she said. "Because if you knew the truth, about who I am, and where I'm from, you would hate me."

"Sweetheart," I said, "I- just can't imagine that that's true."

"That's because you don't know," she explained. "And at first I didn't care, I was so- hungry, and so tired, and you fed me and let me rest, and didn't hurt me, and I didn't care about anything else. But once I was better, I knew it was wrong, to let you be so good to me, when if you knew- and I thought maybe when you came I would be able to tell you, but I can't. I can't stand it, the way you would look at me, if you knew. But I need you to- I just need you to do me this one favor."

"Right," I said. "What is it?"

"I can't stay with you," she said. "I can't keep letting you- protect me, when if you knew- but I can't be out here on my own, either. So- what I need to ask, ma'am, is, could you just, please, kill me?"

"What?" I asked, praying I'd misheard her.

"Kill me," she said, looking up at me, hopeful and excited and nervous, like a child asking for an expensive toy for Christmas. "You could do it quick, without- without hurting me. Couldn't you? And I wouldn't be scared, if it was you. And then it would all be over- and everything would be all right."

"Oh my God," I said. "I-"

I stood up so quickly I got a head rush, and swayed.

"Ma'am?" she said tentatively.

"Oh, my God," I said again. "Oh, Jesus Christ, Ruby, I don't- I can't-"

She scrambled to her feet and came to me; I reached out blindly, and she took my hands in hers, searching my face anxiously.

"You're upset," she said. "I didn't mean to upset you."

"You didn't think it would _upset_ me?"

"I didn't know it would," she said. "I'm sorry. It's not- it's not anything to be- upset about, ma'am. There are lots worse things that could happen to me."

I held onto her hands for a few moments, trying to steady myself, trying to figure out what to say.

"Ruby," I said finally, and she nodded seriously, listening. "Do you know how many people I've killed in my life?"

"No, ma'am," she said.

"I don't either," I said. "I've lost count. Some of them I don't even remember. If you showed me their faces I wouldn't recognize them. And some of them- some I won't ever be able to forget. I dream about them when I'm asleep, and when I'm awake, I remember. Their names, and their faces, and what they said to me, and the way they- fell-" I swallowed hard. "I'm not trying to- to over-dramatize this- but I am trying to imagine what would happen to me, to my already overtaxed sanity, if I killed you- my sweet, brave girl-"

She made a soft sound, a shocked little whimper, as if I'd doused her with cold water.

"And I am pretty sure," I said, thinking out loud, trying for an accurate assessment, "that I would either fall back down in the dirt and just never get back up, or I would put my gun in my own mouth and pull the trigger. I couldn't stand it. I could not. And I couldn't stand it if you walked away from me again, knowing everything that could happen to you out there, and that I could have spared you at least some pain and fear if I'd been able to do this for you. So." I tried for a smile; she looked distressed. "If you make me choose between those two things, either way, I will lose my mind, and die. And the Minutemen will crumble into disarray, and Shaun will be an orphan, and Hancock will be- sad, and everybody who needs my help, which it seems like is everybody in the Commonwealth at some point, will be fucked forevermore. Or you could have mercy on me, and come home, and pick tarberries, and play checkers, and be happy."

"But-" she began miserably. "If you knew-"

"Well, I _don't_ know, do I?" I said, hearing a ragged edge of hysteria creeping into my voice. "Because you won't tell me! Which is fine, you can have all the unspeakable secrets you want, but it means that I'm stuck with what I can imagine, which is- nothing that makes killing you make sense. I mean, if you're a Brotherhood infiltrator, or a weirdly scrawny Institute courser, or a mirelurk killclaw disguised as a girl- I don't care, all right? If you had any nefarious plans for me or the Slog at any point you've clearly ditched them, or else they're so goddamn byzantine that I'll be kind of honored to be destroyed by them. Or if it's something you can't call off, if there's a homing chip in your spinal cord that's summoning an army of doom, bring it the fuck on. That's why we have missile turrets. Ruby, I didn't sleep last night, and I am so, so tired, and I am begging you, can we please, _please_ , just go home?"

She stared at me for awhile, long enough and intently enough that I started trying to picture what she was seeing. The rough hair; I hadn't combed it before setting out. The bags under my no-doubt-bloodshot eyes. I wasn't old yet, but I was old enough now that missing sleep made me look older, instead of just sleepy. There used to be mirrors everywhere; now there were few enough that catching my reflection always came as a shock, like running into a friend who used to be so perky in college.

"Yes, ma'am," she said finally. "Take me home."

…..

When we walked back onto the pavement of the Slog, quite a few people cheered spontaneously, and Shaun came running and hugged Ruby around the waist first, before he hugged me.

"I knew you'd bring her back," he told me.

Hancock said, "Good to have you home, kid."

Ruby was blushing, looking down, disconcerted by all the attention. I took her hand, and she squeezed mine back, hard.

"All right, all right," I said. "Yes, we're all very happy Ruby's home safe, but she's been through a lot, so let's let her get some beauty rest. Come on, Ruby."

I walked her back to her cabin, where she sat down slowly on the bed, watching me.

"Thank you," I said. "For coming home. Anything you need before I crash?"

She turned and looked up at the nail by her bed, where the locket was still hanging.

"I forgot to ask about your gun," I said. "They took it, I guess? I'll give you another one tomorrow."

She reached up, took the locket from the nail, and held it out to me on her open palm.

"Will you put it back on me?" she asked.

I took it and fastened it, with shaking fingers, around her neck. She reached up and touched it with a fingertip, looking at me.

"Thank you," she said.

"You're welcome, sweetheart," I said, and went, reeling a little, back to my own cabin, where Hancock was waiting for me, sitting on the bed.

"Got everything sorted out?" he asked.

"Kind of," I said, and lay down on the bed with my head in his lap and my arms around his waist, my cheek resting on his thigh. He combed his fingers through my hair, catching tangles in the gnarl of his fingers. "There's some big secret she's keeping, she's going nuts with it, and she won't tell me. She said I'd hate her if I knew the truth."

"Huh," he said. "Seems unlikely."

I laughed a little. "That's what I said. But I guess I said- something- to make her feel better. I don't even know what. I was just- rambling- but I think she's all right now. I hope. I think maybe we can-"

If I finished my sentence, it was in my sleep, and I don't know what I said. I slept like the dead, and dreamed of Sanctuary Hills, clean and whole, a summer dream full of sunlight and chilled watermelon and coleslaw. Nate was cooking hamburgers on the grill. Shaun sat in the grass at my feet, playing with brightly colored toy cars. I was pregnant, my hands cupped gently over my belly; it wasn't that swollen yet, but I knew.

I woke up eleven hours later, alone in bed, widowed and definitely not pregnant, and in the grip of a sickening certainty that Ruby had killed herself while I slept. She hadn't, though. She was back at work in the tarberry bog, and when I caught her eye, she waved.

…..

Life settled back down surprisingly quickly, considering. She didn't seem particularly changed by what had happened, except that sometimes, when I looked at her, I caught her watching me, and she didn't immediately look away when I met her eye. She'd give me a little smile, sometimes, and I noticed she touched her necklace a lot, although that could just have been nervous fidgeting. She was still quiet; she still called me _ma'am_ , never _Nora._ She sat close by me in the evenings, though, and once when she leaned up against me, I put my arm around her, and she laid her head down on my shoulder and nestled closer. I looked up and caught Hancock's eye, and he smiled.

It was about a week after I'd brought her back when I got a call over Radio Freedom, and decided to go ahead and take it. I couldn't suspend normal operations forever, and she seemed to be in a good place. I didn't fret too much on the trip; I even suggested to Hancock that since we were in the neighborhood, we should take a detour and check in on some old friends.

When I got back, she waded, dripping, up out of the tarberry bog and smiled at me. Shaun jumped up into my arms, and I swung him around, then put him back down and handed him a vacuum tube.

"Thanks, mom," he said. "Where did you go this time?"

"Faneuil Hall, to clear out some super mutants," I said. "And then we stopped by Railroad HQ, to see- what, Hancock?"

He'd elbowed me in the ribs and was looking at Ruby.

"Oh," I said, feeling stupid for having failed to make the connection between the fact that she had an unidentified dark secret and the fact that I was a secret agent of a secret organization that I should probably shut up about. "Uh, I'll finish telling you later, all right, Shaun?"

"I'll leave," said Ruby, and before I could say anything, she'd splashed back down into the tarberry bog.

"I said where Railroad HQ is, right?" I asked Hancock in a low voice. "You think Operation Freckleface just entered phase twenty-seven-alpha?"

"I don't really think she's a threat, Nor," he said. "And you didn't really narrow it down any more than 'follow the Freedom Trail' does. I just figured I'd stop you before you said anybody's name. Code name. Better safe, right?"

"Did you see Tinker Tom?" asked Shaun, in a loud whisper.

"Yeah, kiddo," I said quietly, sitting down on the pavement. "And Desdemona, and Deacon, and Dr. Carrington. They all asked about you."

"Do they still live underground?" he asked.

"Yeah," I said. "Maybe someday they'll move back up to the surface, like us, but for now, they think it's safer underground."

"It is," he said. "But I think it's still better up here. Is Ruby a spy?"

"Uh, I don't think so," I said. "But let's not talk about the Railroad to her, all right? We haven't really known her very long."

"I think we have," said Shaun.

"It feels like we have," I agreed. "But still."


	5. Chapter 5

After supper and checkers and conversation that night, when people had mostly gone to bed, I fixed myself a Dirty Wastelander- two parts whiskey, one part each Nuka Cola and fresh squeezed mutfruit juice- and went outside to sit by the pool and sip. I wasn't drowning my sorrows- or my rage or guilt or terror- for a change. Quite the contrary. I was feeling all right. The summer air had started to crisp and sharpen a little bit, turning towards fall. I was sleeping pretty well. The Slog was thriving. The Railroad hadn't even had anything for me to do. Everything I knew about right now- that I could have done anything about, anyway- was more or less all right. I'd drink to that.

When someone came up behind me, then sat down next to me, I thought it would be Hancock, but when I turned to look, it was Ruby.

"Hey," I said. "What's up, buttercup?"

"Peachy keen, jelly bean," she said carefully, and smiled when I burst out laughing. "Is that right? Shaun taught me to say that."

"That's great," I said. "He adores you, you know. If this was the olden days, he'd be begging me to go out to dinner so you could babysit."

She looked at me blankly, and I took a moment to appreciate how much her blank look had changed since the first time I saw it, from _I don't know what you mean, don't hurt me_ to _I don't know what you mean, but if it matters, you'll explain._

"It doesn't matter," I said. "Did you need something?"

"No, ma'am," she said. "But may I ask you a question?"

"Sure," I said. "Ask away."

"I hope you don't mind," she said, "but- I did hear you mention the Railroad, earlier."

"Yeah, that was my fault," I said. "So yeah, the cat's out of the bag. I'm with the Railroad. Was that your question? If you have more questions about the Railroad, I probably shouldn't answer them. The whole thing's kind of hush-hush."

"Yes, ma'am," she said. "I don't want you to tell me anything that's a secret, but can you just tell me, is it true they- the Railroad- they try to help synths?"

"Yeah, that's right," I said. "That's not a secret. I mean, if you were working for an enemy of the Railroad- not that I think you are- but if you were, you would know that much already. Why?"

"Why do you want to help synths?" she asked.

"Oh, not you too," I said. "If I had a nickel- I mean, a bottlecap- for everyone who ever asked me that question—well, the short answer is, because they're people and they need help."

"I thought they were just—machines," she said. "Things. I thought they just looked like people, but they weren't really."

"That's a common misconception, sweetheart," I said, "but I've met quite a few of them now, and I can assure you it's not the case. They're people. They're not completely _human_ —just partly—but they're people. They think and feel and want and choose, and some of them are great and some of them are horrible, just like everybody else. And some of them need help sometimes, and I help when I can, just like with everybody else."

She was quiet for a little while, and then she said, "What's the long answer?"

"Sorry?"

"You said that was the short answer," she said. "Is there a longer answer? Why you want to help them?"

"You don't miss a trick, do you?" I asked, smiling at her, and she smiled back. "Yeah, there's a long answer, but it's—a long story. You sure you want to hear it?"

She nodded. "If it's not a secret."

"It's not a secret," I said. "It's just- well, all right. So, once upon a time, a long time ago, my baby- my son- was stolen from me."

She frowned. "Shaun was stolen? When he was a baby?"

"This was- a different son," I said. Well, it was true; it was a different son from the one she was talking about. "And it was the Institute that took him. Do you know about the Institute?"

"Yes," she said. "They make the synths."

"Made," I said.

She looked puzzled.

"Back when the Institute existed, I mean," I said. "Before they got blown to hell. You didn't hear about that? I guess it happened while you were- not hearing much gossip. A little more than a year ago." I kind of liked the sound of that- _a little more than a year._ Eventually it would be _years_.

"The Institute is _gone_?" she asked, sounding stunned. "I- how? What happened?"

"Well, like I said, they kidnapped my son," I said. "Because they wanted a source of human DNA, to bioengineer a new line of synths. And it took me a long time to get to them, and when I finally did- when I found a way inside the Institute- they'd already done it. Used his DNA. All of the synths, the ones who are part human- the part of them that _is_ human is made from my son's genetic material. Which is mine, too, and my husband's. They're my flesh and blood. My descendants. My children."

She was silent beside me. I drained my glass and set it down on the pavement.

"But you asked what happened to the Institute," I said. "Well, they stole my baby to make people out of, and then they treated those people they made, my other sons and daughters, like shit. Like slaves. Like _things_. I'd be walking around the Institute, and I was supposed to be marveling at all the amazing scientific advances being made in the field of artificial gorillas or whatever bullshit, and all I could see was the synths, down on their knees scrubbing floors, or being used as medical test subjects. I'd hear the humans order them around, insult them, threaten them with reprogramming- with _death_ , essentially- for the slightest little thing. Things that weren't even their fault. And they all- all the synths- they smiled at me, whenever I looked at them. They smiled, because they didn't dare not to. They'd been ordered to—treat me well."

I was quiet a moment, remembering. I hadn't thought about that part in a while: the rigid smiles on all their faces, the obsequious things they'd said when I tried to talk to them, the slight stiffening of their bodies that let me know a courser was nearby. Or worse, that there wasn't a courser, just me.

"And I couldn't stand it," I said. "I couldn't let it go on. So I worked with the Railroad, and some synths who trusted us, and we fucked up the nuclear reactor, and detonated the whole thing. We got the synths out first. And some of the humans. But not all of them. And not- not my son. I couldn't- well, I couldn't get him out. I wish- more than anything I wish- that I could have-"

I'd started to cry, a little, and I wiped at my eyes with my hand.

"Sorry," I said. "I don't talk about this much. I'm not all right with it, really- I mean, I'm not all right, in general. You know that. You've seen- but it was the only thing I could think of to do, to give my children- what I could. A chance, at least. I wish it could have been-"

I broke off, startled; she had reached out and taken my tear-wet hand in hers, and was lifting it, solemnly, to her lips. She kissed my knuckles, and then turned my hand over and kissed the palm. I felt the way Hancock must have felt when she shook him awake in the night; it was so unlike her that I had no idea how to respond. She looked up at me, still holding my hand.

"What is it, sweetheart?" I asked, and then, "Oh- _oh_ \- oh my God, I'm so stupid-"

"You're not stupid," she said, smiling, tears shining in her eyes. "Don't say that about my mother."

I don't know which of us reached for the other first, or if I just kind of collapsed onto her, but somehow her arms were around me, and I was clinging to her, sobbing, my chest heaving. I couldn't remember the last time I'd cried like this. I wanted desperately to stop, wanted to pull it together, straighten up, regain my equilibrium, but it was like falling from a height, like being hit with a tire iron; there was nothing to do but live through it. She stroked my hair and held me tightly.

"I'm glad now you didn't kill me," she said, and I laughed and sobbed at the same time, and almost choked.

"Don't," I managed. "Don't even joke-"

"I didn't know," she said. "I thought maybe you'd kill me anyway, if I told you what I was. I wanted to die while you still— well. I'm glad—you don't hate me."

…..

"I thought you were a courser, at first," she said, a while later, when I'd stopped crying and sat back up and pulled myself more or less back together, and we sat hand in hand. "When you first found me. I kept expecting one to come. That's what- remember when I told you that I told them, the first raiders, that someone would come for me? I told them I was a synth, and a courser would come for me."

"Oh, shit," I said. "Yeah, that was probably a mistake."

"I don't know," she said pensively. "I think it's what made them sell me, when they got tired of me- because I was a thing. If I'd been a person, a human, they probably would have just killed me instead. Not that I didn't wish they would, sometimes. The last ones- the ones you killed- they were the worst. They called me _it_. They cut me sometimes, when they were on a lot of chems, to try to find metal."

"If you're trying to inspire me to figure out how to kill people more than once," I said, "you're doing a fabulous job."

"Once was enough," she said, smiling. "All that gunfire, and yelling- and I thought, finally, _finally_ , I'm about to hear someone say 'Y4-15, initialize factory reset.' And then- you didn't say that." She laughed a little. "I thought, coursers are a lot- friendlier- than they used to be."

"I'm glad I made a good first impression," I said. "Ruby- I mean- did you say Y4-15?"

"That's my designation," she said. "You can see why I didn't want to tell you my name."

"Yeah, I guess that would have been a little bit of a giveaway," I said. "What do you want me to call you now? Y4-15, or Ruby? Or something else? Did you have a name picked out, when you escaped?"

"No," she said. "It all happened- fast. Mr. Binet- do you know him? Is he really with the Railroad?"

"He was," I said. "I'm sorry, he- he's dead."

"Oh," she said. "I- well, I spent a long time hating him. I thought he'd lied to me. He told me I was slated to be wiped and reprogrammed, and he said he could get me out, and that once I was on the surface, someone would meet me, and keep me safe, and tell me where to go next. And then- the people who came were-"

"That wasn't Liam's fault, sweetheart," I said. "If it was anybody's fault, it was ours- the Railroad's. I don't know what happened- you said January? Of last year? That would have been before I joined. But I've seen enough bodies of Railroad agents, at safehouses and checkpoints they died defending, to know that it wasn't for lack of trying that they didn't come for you. It just- but I'm so sorry, that the raiders found you first."

"It's not your fault," she said. "You're the one who did come for me."

"Better late than never, I guess," I said. "So, I hope this isn't an insensitive question, but why on earth would you be- wiped and reprogrammed? Or do you even know?"

"I think I know," she said. "I'd been given orders that were—that the man who gave them to me wouldn't have wanted anyone else to know he'd given me. I'd been instructed to, to be discreet—and I hadn't disobeyed, I hadn't told anyone—but he was—he didn't, um, I think he didn't—trust me."

"What kind of orders?" I asked. "Like for a secret project?"

"Not exactly," she said. "Do you know—did you ever meet—Eve?"

"Uh, yeah," I said. "That's the one who lived in Dr. Binet's quarters, right? She told me she was a 'personal synth'?"

"Yes," she said. "Well—I wasn't a personal synth, so it would have been considered—inappropriate. What I'd been ordered to do."

"Jesus Christ," I said. "And then he- all right, who was it? Which of those miserable fuckers- if he's not dead already, I'll fucking hunt him down and-"

"It doesn't matter now, mother," she said, and I gasped involuntarily. "I'm sorry, ma'am, that was presumptuous of me. I should have asked if you would permit me to call you-"

"Yes," I said, fresh tears spilling down my face. "Yes. Of course. Please. But, Ruby- Y4-15- listen. There's something I have to tell you."

I did have to tell her, I knew I did, even if I didn't want to. She deserved to know what her options were.

"You've been through so much," I said. "And there's this doctor. A neurosurgeon, a friend of the Railroad. She works with synths, to design and implant new memories. So you- so synths can forget all the awful things that happened in the past. All the fear, and pain. And start over, with a new life."

"No," she said, her hand tightening on mine. "You said you wouldn't send me away. You promised."

"I won't, my darling," I said, trying not to sound too thrilled. "Not as long as you want to stay with me. But if she could take away all those terrible memories, maybe you'd be happier, less afraid-"

"No," she said again. "I'm not afraid any more. I was only afraid you'd find out what I was, and hate me, for letting you think I was a real person."

"You _are_ a real person," I protested.

"I know that _now_ ," she said, with just enough impatience in her voice to give me some unexpected pleasure. Shaun was still in _gee whiz, mom_ mode, which was great, but there was something to be said for a good solid _honestly, mother._ "You just finished telling me everything you did for me and the other synths, because of what we mean to you- and that's not even counting everything you did for me, even before you knew who I was. Why would I want to forget any of that? How could I be any happier, than to know all that, and be with you?"

"Well," I said, willing myself not to burst into tears again. I'd already cried enough tonight to last me through till next August. "If you change your mind-"

"I'll let you know," she said. "Mother, may I ask you something?"

"Anything," I said. "Especially if you keep calling me that."

She smiled. "I just- there's something I don't understand. Your son- you said we were all created from his DNA. But they told us we were created from Father's DNA."

"Father was my son," I said. "I know it seems crazy. It is crazy. I was in cryo-stasis, his whole life. Frozen, so deeply that I didn't age. That's why I look young. Younger than him, I mean. I'm really over two hundred years old. Two hundred and forty-three, now, I think."

"Oh," she said. "Well. I'm- you said it's 2288? So I'm- five. Five years old."

"Ha," I said. "What a weird post-apocalyptic nuclear family. You, me, Hancock, and Shaun. Shit, I haven't even told you about Shaun yet. I don't think I have the energy tonight. I'm exhausted, sweetheart, and you must be- wait, do you even sleep?"

"No," she said. "But I- rest. And sometimes, after everyone's in bed, I go up on the roof of the bunkhouse, and look at the stars. I know you're probably used to them, but I'm not, not yet. That first night I was on the surface, I was sitting there waiting for someone to come and help me, and it got dark, and the stars came out. I'd never seen- anything like it, in the Institute. I looked at them until- for as long as I could."

She sighed and looked at me, and then lifted my hand to her lips again.

"Don't look like that, mother," she said. "I've got my whole life to see stars, now. Because of you. You should go to bed, I can see you're sleepy, but may I ask you one more question first?"

"Oh, don't stand on ceremony," I said. "You're five years old, and I'm your mother. Answering your questions is my job. That and brutally murdering anyone who fucks with you."

She laughed, her eyes clear and untroubled as a sunny sky, full of love and trust. I was looking forward to getting used to that- seeing her eyes with nothing to hide, and with no trace of fear. I might even get used to the sound of her laughter, someday; it might become an ordinary thing I took for granted, instead of a shock of joy to my solar plexus, hearing her fearless laugh.

"All right," she said. "If you'd had a daughter- to name- what would you have named her?"

"Oh," I said, past the tightness in my throat. "Emily. We- Nate and I- we were going to name a girl Emily."

"Would you-" She hesitated. "I mean, would it be-"

"Perfect," I said. "I think that would be- perfect." I leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead. "Good night, Emily."

"Good night, mother," she said. "I'll see you in the morning."

….

Hancock stirred when I climbed into bed next to him, and reached out to pull me in close against him.

"Hey," he said sleepily. "You're- your face is wet. What's wrong?"

"Nothing," I said. "Nothing's wrong. Everything's all right."

"Now I know that's a goddamn lie," he said, and I laughed, with only a tiny hitch of a sob at the end.

"It's less of a lie than usual," I said, laying my head down on his chest. "Go back to sleep. I have something to tell you in the morning. Something good."

"I'll look forward to that," he said, as I closed my eyes, and saw stars.

…

The end! That's all she wrote. Thanks so much for reading, and especially for reviewing!


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